In general in big cities "guanxi" plays a smaller role, while in small cities especially the underdeveloped ones it plays a bigger role, to the extent that even doing some fairly trivial business (or even things like getting a passport or going to hospital) needs you to have some "guanxi". By "needs one to have some 'guanxi'" I mean it's not impossible for one to do without "guanxi" but it's just way smoother and faster if you know someone who can help. That's also one of the reasons people prefer to live in big cities. It's just more fair for young people without acquaintances in every possible field. On the other hand, parents are more familiar with "guanxi".
The existence of "guanxi" also makes people doubt if they have failed to lubricate some "guanxi" if they got rejected or failed for something (e.g. U.S. visa, or a reasonable exam) even if there are other reasons more likely to cause it.
"guanxi" sometimes even helps one to pass the test for driver's license, oh a big facepalm to road security...
(What I said above is not to confuse you guys, the wikipedia page is still worth reading though.)
It has a lot in common with corruption but in a communist state it is the norm. Because communism fails at selecting performance, nothing really works and the state institutions are the first affected, but it spreads eventually in the whole society. Thus, the only way to get something is as a favor from someone. You don't go to the institution but you go to someone who "works" there.
So another way to describe these guanxi is : networks of influence with favors as money.
I'm always amused when people project a Western-centric viewpoint when talking about China. This has very little to do with Communism and everything to do with China's own history and cultural development.
Chinese culture has always placed a strong emphasis on interpersonal relationships because institutions besides the state have always been relatively weak, and the agents of the state formed a close-knit, elite class that interacted with one another personally.
For over two thousand years, the state bureaucracy has been the strongest institution in China at the local levels. Even during the Nationalist period and in pre-modern times, you'd better believe the average person would a good relationship with their local official if they wanted to get anything done effectively.
Controlling nepotism and corruption within the bureaucracy has been a perennial concern during every single dynasty of China, going all the way to the Qin dynasty in 200 B.C.
Also, you definitely need good interpersonal networks to do business effectively in Singapore, Hong Kong, or Taiwan, despite the fact that none of those polities have experienced direct Communist rule.
It differs how much it influences daily interactions, citywide or regionally. In Beijing it is noticeable in a lesser degree, but often is perceived by outsiders/foreigners as 'bribing' when a small present is involved.
Edit: I do not mean anything bad. I have lived in Beijing, China for many years (married to a Chinese). Just some foreigners have more difficulty to understand this (as the reasoning why they call it the G-word). I hate to call this a 'cultural difference', as I believe it is mostly related to misunderstanding. This is all due to a different upbring, in a different environment (and receiving a different sense of what is common). This can often lead to misunderstandings as people perceive the actions in the wrong way. It might help to have a look at Cultural Dimensions [https://docs.com/gerard-braad/1061/cultural-dimensions-asia]. This explains some of the things involved. Just a translating it to 'relationship' does not mean it has the same meaning. Many words and concepts are different between cultures. TL;DR It is definitely not the negative words mentioned below. Just 'smoothing' a relationship which seems beneficial should not be seen as brown-nosing. Above; hyh1048576 explained it very well. People blame themselves if they got rejected for something... others might judge them as saying they haven't put enough 'effort' into it. When the relation seems beneficial, they will try to do something to 'smoothing' the relationship. But as mentioned, in Beijing this happens in a much lesser degree but not invisible.
There's nothing uniquely Chinese about the notion that having strong relationships with the right people can make your life easier.
Having a good relationship is important. Giving a token of appreciation is accepted and often expected?
Consider a student who studies abroad and gives such a token to his professor. Totally unaware that a few days later he gets dismissed from the university for bribing. (Or involves a lot of back and forth between the universities to explain the behaviour. This is something we have seen many times)
Now let's look at the foreign manager working in China. Building relationships by exchange of a businesscard is normal. A small gift, like a pen is accepted. But he doesn't know how to respond to a situation when some rituals are involved; such as paying for a dinner. But often relationships extend beyond a business situation and people can ask you for a small 'favour' that is unrelated to business... but can put someone in a very awkward position, as it does influence further business (and often complicates it). Managers who go abroad are sometimes even warned about this when going here. Note: which I believe is also bad as it creates a stigma and prevents from understanding it. Maybe after a few months he understands more of it, but he will likely ignore the reasoning or the actual intent. But again, this is not specific to China (happens in most Asian countries and the West or anywhere else in some form or way).
It also work at a much lower level: if you have good "guanxi" with the boss of the abr in front of your door and often brings friends, he will be nice and, say, call you if the cops are coming when your car is not correctly parked.
Also, if you build your own house, some neighbourghs might play it nice and allow you to use a bit of the public road to stock piles of brick or whatever.
All of these mean we are not wild beast living in the forest, neither are we cowboys, we have a to live in a society and having good relationships with anyone around you (upwards, downwards and at the same level) is very desirable.
In Germany we have "Vitamin B", i.e. beneficial relationships. In America, on the other hand, they have this strange concept of meritocracy.
I can definitely understand ladder-climbing in the workplace but there are countless instances of people acting without dignity or restraint. It's downright unsightly.
I do not think it's particularly more difficult to grok than any other Chinese words or concept that represent non-trivial aspects of Chinese society and culture.
http://i.imgur.com/8XvwPnl.jpg
"I like to do things in the formal way. Utilizing the Chinese Guan Xi method is limited to direct contact only. Unless I have no other ways to make things happen. I do like to keep simply relationship with others, instead of a GuanXi just for profit"
Chinese often try to sugarcoat guanxi. But to put it bluntly, it is for law/rule breaking or law/rule bending favors to acquaintances. Only because the Chinese have practiced it for millenniums as a daily surviving activities, just as eating and sleeping, the Chinese have forgotten that it's an ugly way of life. Guanxi in China is not a shameful matter _at all_, but a proud and face-boosting accomplishment which is often boasted in meetings and banquets, on social networks, and announced publicly and proudly to anybody as a show of strength.
So, the absolute necessity of guanxi, the enormous amount of utilities, the glories associated with it, most people not grown up in China/Taiwan would find it impossible to play at China's extreme level.
What's the secret source to crack guanxi in China? IMHO, it is this: always remind yourself __the lack of trust is at the core of the Chinese society__, and deduce from there. Law and law enforcement are not trustful, so you need to have friends in the government. Business contracts are not to be trusted at all, so constant monitoring and vigilance are absolute necessary during the entire business interaction with your Chinese partner, even though the contract signing ceremony was attended by high level governmental officials and announced on national newspapers! Doctors and nurses will probably give sloppy or delayed treatment because they are expecting money and gifts from you or your relatives before they treat you, if they are not in your guanxi network, so always work on your network to include someone in hospitals. Don't trust the law to punish the bad doctors for such cruelty, there is no such thing. You get the picture. Now anybody still say it's similar in developed western countries? :)
So how to go about build guanxi in China? If you have overcome the unbearable loath on the whole matter and said to yourself, I am gonna play it all the way to fucking make it in China. My advice is, do what the Chinese do. The No.1 approach used by Chinese to build guanxi is to __inject fixed|irremovable elements into your relationship with someone__ if you want to guanxi that person. Such fixed|irremovable elements include things such as born in the same province, graduated from same school, served in the same division in the army, have worked in the same company(maybe at different time), related to each other by blood no matter how distant that is, basically anything that will not change for the rest of your life, and preferably the elements happened in the past, not recently, as history and time add a little seriousness and trustworthiness to it. In contrast, fickle things in relationships (in the eyes of the Chinese) are things such as your abilities and accomplishments, your credentials, social status, the promises made, member of the same club at this moment (this helps a bit but needed further enhancement), etc. Fire up your imagination and creativity to find out the fixed elements in guanxi, promote it, enhance it, and build from there.
People find it impossible to play at China's "extreme level" not because the level is extreme, but simply because of cultural differences. All you have to do is to look at how Chinese friends and American friends treat each other. The Chinese are much more generous in lending money to their friends, or sharing food, or wtv, something that simply doesn't happen in the West. This, of course, also has nothing to do with extreme lack of trust, or attempting to build guanxi for other purposes.
>Doctors and nurses will probably give sloppy or delayed treatment because they are expecting money and gifts from you or your relatives before they treat you, if they are not in your guanxi network, so always work on your network to include someone in hospitals. Don't trust the law to punish the bad doctors for such cruelty, there is no such thing. You get the picture. Now anybody still say it's similar in developed western countries?
There no need in the West for this simply because the health system is multi-tiered. Rich people will just pay more money for better healthcare, thus no need for the whole backdoor stuff.
Anyways, I have yet to seen someone rebuke my argument I wrote previously about how joining a frat and finally getting a job through it is just as "guanxi" as anything else in China.
People mostly get their jobs through recommendations anyways. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/28/business/employers-increas...
That said, guanxi, as a sibling post speculates, is all about trust. It's the idea that beyond a simple task at hand, there is a deeper relationship to be honored, for whatever reason. The "developed" world on the other hand loves the notion of contract and enforcement through the rule of law, so that people wouldn't need to rely on silly things like trust and good will.
The lack of trust is at the core of the State and the legislative system (cf Hobbes) which is distinctive of Western societies.
In the past Chinese have lived in small villages. Even though the land is vast, people rarely moved to other places due to lack of means and the atrocious government policies. So ordinary people dealt with relatives and village folks in their entire lives. Trust was based on the threat that you would be practically dead if you behaved badly and were shunned by the village.
Now coming into the 20th century, people started moving into cities to interact with strangers. It's a new and somewhat shocking experience, because most of them only knew the way of life which you just obey the orders from parents/senior family members, follow the old rituals. Unlike the western countries which went through centuries of Enlightenment, the new Chinese cities are almost void of social and civil code, void of sensible law and law enforcement. That's what China has been through in the last century. Quite a few, now escaped from the watchful eyes of folks back in the villages, use the newly gained freedom to conduct unlawful activities, from fabricating their credentials, to using dirty recycled oil to prepare food, all the way to bribing and accepting bribes to drive people away from their home in order to build a shopping mall. So imho ordinary Chinese do not trust each other that much. They seek insurance(strong guanxi is a form of it) in all daily interactions, and hope others would behave.
Foreigners are definitely included in these circles, it is just that their use is very limited (what good is an English teacher in your network, or a software engineer). Also, the FCPA makes participation dangerous for us Americans, at least. Even giving a doctor a red envelope at a state hospital is in violation.
A very good and realistic, although slightly exaggerated example of the things written here is the book "Party Members" by Arthur Meursault [1]. It has quite a few fantastic scenes describing building and using guanxi as it is done in China on a daily basis. It may seem extreme to those who haven't lived or done business in China, but that's the grim reality of it.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01IJLRVBW, https://camphorpress.com/books/party-members/
Smithers: Unlikely, sir. They spell and pronounce their names differently.
Mr. Burns: Bah! Schedule a game and I'll ask him myself.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsinghua_clique
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuanpai
There is something to be said for unbridled single-minded ambition.
>Guanxi largely originates from the Chinese social philosophy of Confucianism, which stresses the importance of associating oneself with others in a hierarchical manner, in order to maintain social and economic order. Particularly, there is an emphasis on implicit mutual obligations, reciprocity, and trust, which are the foundations of guanxi and guanxi networks.
The "hierarchical" part seems to be crucially lacking in your example.
A good example imo of Guanxi networks in the West are College Alumni Networks, as well as the more recent but analogous Startup Accelerator Network. The "older/younger class" relationship makes these Hierarchical.
This is the part hinting at the fact that Don Corleone is in a higher position of power. And since this is Don Corleone speaking, you are missing the way he is being adressed by the one asking the favor - clearly looking up to him.
Hierchical power structures are not just a part of Confucianism, there are everywhere around the globe.
1) How do you build guanxi?
2) How do you maintain guanxi?
3) How is guanxi lost after it's been gained?
4) Give me an example with two people where one has far more guanxi than another. How are they treated differently by the third party they have guanxi with? (No direct familial relation)
Treating people to dinner and getting them drunk is a pretty common way of building guanxi. I've had people invite me to dinner and give me alcohol I don't want, hoping to then get something out of me later. The whole thing is terribly uncomfortable, largely because I simply don't like going to dinner with people I don't know well, and do not feel like I owe them anything afterwards (if anything, I'm annoyed that they've imposed on my time). Then they call up week or two later and say "hey, can you help me out with this thing", and then I have to decide what to do about that.
Like I said in my other comment, though, plenty of Chinese people don't like working this way either. My friends are real friends, and the people I usually work with are professionals, people who don't need to pretend that now we're blood brothers and we'll bend the rules to help each other. I've been in China for 15 years, and I've seen this kind of professionalism slowly supplanting the old system.
You lose guanxi by pissing off your "friends", or not returning favors. In my case, I can play the "I'm a weird foreigner and don't understand your rules" card, and I've only ever mildly annoyed a few people.
This also leads to somewhat amusing cultural disconnects. For instance, I was once interviewing a Chinese student for an officer position in the student club of which I was already an officer. (This is at a US university and I'm Chinese American) He came to the interview and gave me a bottle of 7-up.
> Roughly equivalent words in other languages include sociolismo in Cuba; blat in Russia; guanxi in Chinese and Vetternwirtschaft in German, protektzia in Israeli slang, un pituto in Chilean Spanish, In Brazilian-Portuguese it is referred to as "pistolão", "QI" (Quem Indica, or Who Indicates), or in the slang "peixada", "Pidi Padu" in Malayalam, "arka" or "destek" in Turkish.
There's a joke (mostly making fun of modern Israeli pretensions to clean modern society) - the kids these days don't mess with protektsiya, they have "connections" (the English word) instead.
"The build is broken, did your push break it?" "Uun, kankei nai" = no, it's unrelated.
Which is not to say that Japan doesn't have its own complex web of social obligations and favors (giri, osewa, senpai/kohai etc), they just don't use the same word for it.
When Elon buys SolarCity and the CEO is his cousin, that's guanxi.
When your boss gives a promotion to guy who plays golf with him, that's guanxi.
When you give your buddy a referral to a job because he helped you out with yours, that's guanxi.
It's a necessary social lubricant that also spawns nepotism, favoritism, cronyism, corruption, etc and can be found in every business large enough, especially the government.
And unlike what some posters seem to think, it's not a Chinese-only thing. It's a universal thing that has a Chinese word that nicely refers to it, and thus more recognized in Chinese society.
Is it just me, or has the yuan significantly appreciated in value...?
I know plenty of Chinese people who are highly annoyed or disgusted by the necessity of cultivating guanxi, but know that they're not going to get what they're after otherwise.
